


a girl who loves you

by cakecakecake



Category: Hey Arnold!
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bisexuality, F/F, One-Sided Relationship, POV Second Person, Substitution, Unrequited Love, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:53:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26269042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cakecakecake/pseuds/cakecakecake
Summary: she gives you a hand to hold, and you tell yourself that it's enough.
Relationships: Helga Pataki/Lila Sawyer
Comments: 8
Kudos: 18





	a girl who loves you

**Author's Note:**

> you can't tell me eugene was the only one outta ps 118 to turn out gay. 
> 
> the patakis is never happening so that means i can daydream. here's something sad.

There’s a girl who loves you, but you don’t love her. 

It’s not because she’s a girl -- you love girls. You don’t know when that started, you just know it’s true. It was never about what someone was, not for you. Girls, boys, neither, both. Others, and more. It's what’s inside that matters. He taught you that. You could love anyone, you just don’t love her.

But she loves you. She thinks she has for a long time. _Since we were twelve_ , she tells you. You’re sixteen and you just broke it off with someone you’ve _always_ loved, because he’s not here and you don’t know when he’s coming home. ( _if_ he’s ever coming home.) You can’t ask him to wait and he can’t expect you to. (even if you would.) 

So when she asks you, you say yes. _It’ll be our little secret_ , she says, a little kiss behind your ear. Her little hands at the small of your back. Little Miss Perfect. 

She’s a good kisser. You wonder if it’s instinct, or if someone taught her how. Maybe you’re not the first secret of hers. (you hope you'll be the last.)

She’s there for you when it’s hard. Things have always been hard for you, but they only seem to get harder. Your parents are "taking a break", whatever that means. Bob is never home anymore. Miriam is seeing a doctor, and then she’s seeing someone else. Olga comes home one day and tells you she’s taking you away. Not far. Just away from them. The chipping paint on Lila’s bedroom walls hold you in when you cry. Everything is changing. She's your only constant.

She makes you coffee and lights your cigarettes and never asks questions. You never tell her more than she needs to know -- more than you want her to know. You think, by the end of it, she knows more than Arnold ever did. She takes in all your bad moods, all your broken pieces, all your pain, and she takes it all with grace. She gives you a hand to hold when it’s all too much and you tell yourself that it’s enough. 

But when she says she loves you, you don’t say it back.

It’s bad enough that you still love someone else. You may not love her like that, but you love her enough not to lie.

**Author's Note:**

> lila's good


End file.
